Promenade Tecumseh home tour returns June 8-9

Art displays with children's activities and a 5K fun run are being planned along with the tours of historic houses and downtown buildings.

By David FrownfelderDaily Telegram Staff Writer

After taking a year off, the Promenade Tecumseh Historic Home Tour returns the weekend of June 8 and 9.

The home tour is not the only event taking place that weekend. Community Arts of Tecumseh will host Art in the Park at John Smith Park, 804 N. Evans St., both days. On June 9, the Tecumseh Parks and Recreation Department will host a 5K Fun Run next door at the AJ Smith Recreation Center, 810 N. Evans St.

On the home tour, visitors are invited to tour three local homes, downtown apartments and bed-and-breakfast establishments. Tours will be from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day.

The Tecumseh Area Historical Museum, 302 E. Chicago Blvd., will have special displays, and tours of Brookside Cemetery will be offered. In addition, each stop on the tour will have entertainment or an arts demonstration, including spinning, quilting and dulcimer performances.

Tickets are $12 in advance and $15 on the tour weekend. Ages 10 and younger are free. Free parking is available downtown and at each of the tour locations.

Pat VanCamp, who heads the Promenade committee, said the event was moved to June in hopes of having good weather.

“The homes are absolutely beautiful,” she said. “We’ll have a small snapshot of downtown, too. We will have one residence, two bed and breakfasts and one in-progress stop.”

Promenade Tecumseh features homes from 1850 and the 1870s, a 1950s classic ranch and early 20th century homes. Downtown bed-and-breakfast establishments on the tour include The Inn at Evans on the second level of The Boulevard Market, 102 E. Chicago Blvd., and the Chicago Street Suite, above The Daily Grind, 139 E. Chicago Blvd.

The in-progress stop is the upper level of the former Masonic Lodge building on the northeast corner of Chicago Boulevard and Evans Street. The owner of the building is undertaking a renovation of the upper floors of what served as the home for the Tecumseh Masonic Lodge for many years until the newer lodge was built on Bishop Reed Drive.

“The owner is letting us show it as a ‘before’ picture and when he is finished, he will let us look at the apartments,” VanCamp said.

Tours of Brookside Cemetery with local historian Bob Elliot and the 4th Michigan Civil War re-enactors will be offered at 5 and 7 p.m. June 8. The tour features a presentation on the lives of many of Tecumseh’s military veterans and the town’s forefathers. Tickets are $5 and available at the cemetery prior to the tour.

The Promenade was started following Tecumseh’s sesquicentennial celebration in the mid-1970s. The event has featured many historic houses and buildings in the Tecumseh area through the years.

Art in the Park will be from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. June 8 and noon to 5:30 p.m. June 9 in John Smith Park. Original artwork will be displayed in booths featuring ceramics, photography, fiber art, woodcut and linocut prints, and polymer art. Children’s activities are also planned. Admission and parking are free.

The Tecumseh Parks and Recreation Department’s 5K Fun Run will begin and end at the AJ Smith Recreation Center, 810 N. Evans St. The event is sponsored in part by the ProMedica Women’s Health Center in Tecumseh.

The race fee is $25 and includes a shirt. Those registering by May 31 will receive $5 off, said Shelley Lim, the city’s director of cultural and leisure services. Register at the parks and recreation department inside the AJ Smith Recreation Center. For additional information, call the department at 423-5602.

At a glanceWHAT: 2013 Promenade Tecumseh Historic Home TourWHEN: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. June 8 and 9TICKETS: $12 in advance and $15 on the tour weekend; ages 10 and under are free. Tickets are available at the Tecumseh Area Chamber of Commerce, The Daily Grind, the Tecumseh Historical Museum and at all featured homes during tour hours.INFORMATION: Tecumseh chamber, 423-3740, or email promenadetecumseh@gmail.com

WHAT: 2013 Art in the Park, hosted by Community Arts of TecumsehWHEN: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. June 8 and noon to 5:30 p.m. June 9WHERE: John Smith Park, 804 N. Evans St.COST: Free.INFORMATION: www.tecumseharts.org